


Culinary Ethics

by misura



Category: Dragaera - Steven Brust
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-10-03
Updated: 2006-10-03
Packaged: 2017-10-20 06:52:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/209949
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misura/pseuds/misura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Vlad talks about Morrolan's new cook.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Culinary Ethics

There were, of course, rumors. There always are rumors, mostly because Morrolan's the kind of guy who lives by the saying that the only thing worse than having people talk about you, is not being talked about at all. (You wouldn't say so by the way he hacks them to pieces, but secretly, I think Morrolan likes people who insult him to his face a whole lot better than people who suck up to him and force him to smile and be polite to them in return. It's a Dragon-thing, and the only person to whom it doesn't seem to apply is Aliera, who seems to do nothing else than make disparaging comments about Morrolan, yet never gets treated to a few bottles of good wine after the resulting duel.)

Rumors, however, are easy enough to deal with, as every Jhereg knows. Rumors are very flexible and liable to change, for example. Give people something more interesting to talk about, and they'll forget all about that less juicy bit of information you didn't want spread around too quickly. (You can't, as a rule, stop a rumor completely, but you can dillute it and keep it from spreading too fast.)

Sure, Morrolan had a new cook. And sure, the man could cook. That much several hundreds of people could and did agree about. Morrolan had a reputation to keep and start duels about after all. Plus, he had the money to spare to hire the best, as proven by his hiring yours truly as his security-consultant.

Nobody could prove that Morrolan had done what was supposed to be impossible. The Phoenix Guards, if they'd taken an interest in the case, which (luckily for all involved) they didn't, might have been able to dig up the name of Jalid, who ran a reasonably profitable money-lending operation in a territory that was run by ... someone not Vlad Taltos, baronet of the House of the Jhereg. I'm not that stupid, thank you very much.

The Phoenix Guards also would have found that a fairly substantial amount of money had first disappeared from Morrolan's coffers, vanished for three days, and then popped up again as a deposit on the account of the owner of a certain restaurant. They'd have to be very lucky and very dilligent, though, and they'd need to file an official request for information with Morrolan, which he could choose not to honour, or delay for several years.

As I said though, the Phoenix Guards didn't get themselves involved in this. I got a nice bonus for completing my mission, which I was forced to split with Kragar. Morrolan could bask in the glow of having something unique, and being mysterious about how he'd gotten it. I think he enjoyed that last nearly as much as being the center of attention wherever he went.

Valabar's, of course, kept its reputation as being the best restaurant of the Empire. Everyone knew the cooks who worked there were impossible to hire away, no matter how rich or influential you were.

(Really, people do underestimate how persuasive a Jhereg can be, if he puts his mind to it. I'd be insulted, except that people underestimating me comes in quite handy sometimes.)


End file.
